Most of the country stretching from the outskirts of Tripoli east toward Egypt is now in the hands of popular committees allied with local security forces that have defected from the dictator. Even to Tripoli’s west, the rebellion had spread to some small towns. Qaddafi is increasingly left only with a sullen and sanguinary Tripoli, about 1 million people, where the streets are ghostly and marauding security forces hotrod it through the streets, sometimes firing indiscriminately.

Aljazeera Arabic is making the point that a lot hinges on the Libyan tribes’ response to the crisis. The reporter says that the officer corps is actually an assemblage of tribal notables cultivated by Qaddafi over the years, and in the end tribal loyalties may win out. The BBC concurs.

The former leader of the Awlad Sulaiman tribe, Sheikh Saif al-Nasr, went on Aljazeera and broadcast an appeal to the young people of this tribe and others in the south to join in the protests and end the dictatorship.

Likewise, the Tarhun tribe has largely washed its hands of Qaddafi. It is key because about a third of the residents of Tripoli belong to it.

And even some members of Qaddafi’s own Qadhadfa tribe are turning on him.

18 Responses

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That leaves the Colonel in control of only a slice of the oil & gas industry.link to crudeoilpeak.com
Not shown: the Greenstream Natural Gas pipeline to Sicily, that comes ashore 40 miles West of Tripoli.
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At the time that I was writing, it was difficult for me to find a major city aside from Tripoli that wasn’t under rebel control. Libya only has a population of about 6 million. Qaddafi has lost Dirna, al-Bayda, Benghazi, Misurata, as well as the rural areas controlled by the Warfalla (1 million strong) tribe and the 500,000 Tuaregs in the south. His security forces are riposting on Thursday, but as of when I wrote, he just had parts of Tripoli. Hence my guess that just 600,000 or so were still under his domination.

Juan, thank you for highlighting the important role the Libyan tribes play in this uprising giving me cause to read more about the subject e.g. link to globalsecurity.org
From a Western point of view Qaddafi’s intent to substitute tribal rule and customs with education and merit based bureaucracy outweighed his inflammatory rhetoric and his history of terrorist activities. What role do you think will the tribes play in the future? Will they try to roll back Qaddafi’s reforms and substitute lineage, wealth, and piety as leadership criteria?

One of the ways you can tell that Tunisia, Egypt and now Libya underwent a real people’s uprising is that there’s none of that CIA color coded crap : No “Green”,”Orange”, “Rose” revolutions here. Cf the “Jasmin Revolution” being pimped in China.

It is amazing that the Libyan Deputy secretary to the united nation now is saying that Gaddafi used Serbian and Ukrainian pilots to bomb Libyans and asking for no fly zone over Libya. He did not provide any any prove but he said he is sure. What kind of representative of the Libyan people is he? . Keep in mind he is even jumping over the head of the Libyan secretary to the UN himself and disagreeing with him. He should fired him for speading rumors that Serbians pilots are involved in Bombing Libyans. How stupid does this poppet think we are?
Libyans in Benghazi talked to Ben Weidamen and they themselves said they were not bombed but afraid because they heard he used it in Tripoli. Honestly, do Gaddafi and his sons think they can smell the !30 billion dollars that are in foreign banks if they bomb their own people? And Switzerland already froze their accounts.
It shameful and nauseating that this man, without providing any prove, would spread to Libyans and the world these kind of unfounded and baseless rumors and jeopardizes the lives of 5 million Libyans.

Reuters: “Serbian officials are denying reports that its pilots or ground crews had been involved in Libyan air force bombing missions against protesters, and said it was suspending all its arms exports to the country.
by Allan Shifman at 9:04 AM”

Isn’t time for Mr. Dabbshi and everyone trying to get a no fly zone over Libya, in the name of protecting civilians, to stop being poppets and stop asking for an act of war? These still unfounded statements are already being used as facts to provoke a response. WE DON”T WANT ANYMORE WARS AND ANYONE ASKING FOR ANY KIND OF FOREIGN MILITARY INTERVENTION DOES NOT REPRESENT THE WILL OF PEOPLE IN THE MIDDLE EAS. WE CAN GET RID OF OUR OWN DICTATORS. ENOUGH!

david gansel

Just some questions. I am curious about the nature of tribes and clans in the middle east. They seem to be of great political importance not only in Libya but also in Iraq, Arabia, and Afghanistan. Are they anything like the Indian tribes in the US? Why their persistence in Islamic lands? By my understanding the Roman empire was overrun by tribal peoples, but tribalism seems to have disappeared in short order from the barbarian successor kingdoms. One more question: some news reports mention the recruitment by Libya of “mercenaries” to defend the regime. Is there anything to this? If so, who are they?

Isn’t that great? The democratic government that Bush supported had arrested a reporter yesterday that was calling for more protestors on the streets of Bagdad on Friday. Is the US government going to call Al-Maliki to release him as it did for Aljazeera reporters that were arrested by Mubarak? Or this is a personal thing since that this reporter is the one that threw his shoe at president Bush?